Wednesday, November 15, 2006

The first person to take to the microphone on new Good Karma Broadcasting sports outlet WWGK/1540 "Cleveland's ESPN Radio 1540" as a local talk show host will be...

Tony Rizzo.

Well, at least for one day.

The station announced on its website that the FOX 8 sports anchor will host a special two-hour local show Saturday from 10 AM to noon, devoted to all things Ohio State...before the Buckeyes' highly-touted clash with Michigan for a shot to go to the BCS national championship game.

(Or, perhaps, a shot for a rematch in that game.)

The game itself, of course, is on competing Salem sports talker WKNR/850, the Cleveland market affiliate of the Ohio State University radio network.

From the WWGK website:

Join Fox 8 sports anchor Tony Rizzo on Saturday morning from 10 to 12pm. "The Rizz" will preview every angle and give you a chance to sound off on the Buckeyes before kickoff. You can reach the show at (216) 229-7500.

WWGK's blurb on the special show (one day only, as far as we know) says it'll be streamed on ESPNCleveland.com.

Well, at this point, we can't find any sign of local streaming out of the Good Karma operation... and we know that station boss Craig Karmazin has been a reader here, so we'll assume it'll be up sometime in the next couple of days. (Hint!)

Because as it did before, signing up for the station's club under the "listen live" link only takes one to a link to ESPNRadio.com. Not to mention that there's no "login" system, so you have to enter your information EVERY SINGLE TIME.

If there's a link for "Cleveland's ESPN Radio 1540"'s own in-house streaming, we can't find it.

Rizzo, of course, is far too busy to take to the radio airwaves during the week, but would be a rather interesting choice to become a regular local host on WWGK.

Local sports radio fans generally fondly remember him from his time at once-populist sports talk outlet WHK/1420 "The Fan" (now a Salem-owned conservative talk station)...not to mention for his long stint doing sports on WMJI/105.7.

As WJW's primary sports anchor, Rizzo is on the air at FOX 8 during the presumptive hole for a local show on the local ESPN Radio outlet - afternoon drive. But we wouldn't be surprised to hear him as a regular on 1540 on weekends...

15 comments:

RadioInsider
said...

This is a steal for Mr. Karmazin. Riz was one of the top radio personalities when lil ole' WHK built its cult following. With Les Levine right around the corner - Karmazin only lacks a legitimate consistent signal at this point before it starts dominating a ratings "war" with the OCB pipeline.

I was listening to the KSU football game last week, with Bill Needle as the play-by-play guy...and while he has a pleasant speaking voice, his entire delivery just sounds so "arrogant" for some reason...like everything he says, he's just talking "down" to the listener. It was very annoying, and then I remembered why I didn't care for him on WKNR years ago (yes, I was one of the loyal early listeners). He even had the audacity to say Pete Franklin used smoke-and-mirrors (I can still hear the arrogant comment), so I have no desire to hear the needler back on the airwaves. Oh wait, no one can hear this tiny little station, anyway.

Anonymous ragging on Needle. You should spend more time educating yourself instead of acting like a typical 10-year old moron. It could very well be possible it is a delay issue. Unless you're willing to use your REAL name, you should probably refrain from taking your shots from that grassy knoll. The only people you might (key word) be impressing are your fellow elementary school friends on the playground.

To the first person who claimed Needle was arrogant. I worked with the man at WKNR he is extremely arrogant and he thinks way too much of himself. I think working as Bruce Drennan's producer probably helped him along that way. Cleveland needs fresh new hosts on the air not Bill Needle.